Voices
by Saiyan-C
Summary: It's been a year since Julian died for Jenny. But one night, she dreams of him, and he talks about the first Game, when he took on the form of Zach ... and Jenny isn't sure whether he was lying or not when he said Zach thought about her. Hinted JennyZach
1. I Don't Understand

**Disclaimer:** I don't own the Forbidden Game series. Also note that due to inability to find the second and third books in a bookstore anywhere near me, I apologise for any inaccuracies, because it's been a long time since I've read them both. Dammit, I need to find those books: Julian's death of sorts always makes me feel so depressed.

**Notes:** The words in bold (not italics, thanks incarnated-soul, I originally meant for them to be italics, but F F. net wouldn't let it work ¬¬) are quoted lines from 'The Hunter', the first book. I've been reading it over and over for a while now, and I just feel that it's the time to write a little fic of it. Huzzah for Jenny/Zach cousincest of sorts … unless I've not searched thoroughly enough, I don't think this has been written before. I have no idea why; it's hinted several times in the first book alone, though I'm not sure about 'The Chase' and 'The Kill.' Enjoy.

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---Chapter One---**

Jenny blinked again. There was darkness and shadows all around her, and from that void, an icily cold wind blew. She could barely see a few inches in front of her, let alone what was around her. The ground felt solid enough beneath her feet, but she didn't want to move, in case it gave way. Then she'd fall … fall into darkness … and she wouldn't be able to get back.

"Guys?" Jenny called, wrapping her arms around herself. Her voice echoed strangely around her. This had an awful feeling of familiarity, a feeling of creeping fear … something she hadn't felt since last year … when …

She couldn't remember. It was something important, something that could help her, but she couldn't remember what had happened.

"Tom? Are you there?"

Jenny gasped, feeling a tendril of ice or shadow touch her ankle, horribly aware of the wind that was picking up around her, "Dee? Audrey?" Her legs didn't seem to want to listen to her anymore, and she could feel the ice creeping up her calves now. She took a deep shuddering breath, and even though she was blinded in the darkness, she knew that there would be ice crystals forming in the air in front of her face.

"Michael? Summer? Zach? Please, is there anyone there?" She called, her voice growing louder as she rubbed her hands together in a futile attempt to keep the cold away. Her hands felt like they were slowly freezing, and it felt as though the ring on her right hand had melded to her skin.

**"You want to watch out for that cousin of yours too. He really does think about you, you know. I took that impression from life."**

"W-What?" There was someone there. Someone had spoken to her. A voice full of elemental music. Water running over rock.

**"He won't be able to get at you here. No one will, ever."**

"Who's there?" Jenny asked desperately, quite forgetting the ice that was weaving around her legs and steadily up her hips.

Voice like silk-wrapped steel. Velvet. Like a sheet of ice shattering when he was angry …

As the cold began to bite into her flesh, Jenny realised she didn't care who it was out there, even if they were dangerous, because she didn't want to freeze! She didn't want to die!

"Help me!!" She cried out as the frost clung to her arms, weighing them down. "Please, someone, help me!!"

**"Have you ever wondered why you can go into dangerous places without getting hurt?"**

"Please, someone!!"

**"Why the stray animals you pick up never bite you –"**

"Help!!"

**" – why you don't get mugged – or worse – when you wander around bad parts of town at night?"**

"Please help me! Please!"

**"I've been looking after you, Jenny. Watching over you. No one can touch you … no one but me."**

So many voices and images filled her mind, shutting the water voice out. Dee was screaming in fright, trying to ward the Aliens away as blood ran down her leg, Audrey was half – lying on the floor, her face contorted in horror as the draugar came towards her, Michael, delirious with panic as the plants grew all over him, Summer's screams fading away as she ran from the door into her own personal hell, Tom was shackled and chained to the grandfather clock, and –

Zach was holding her tight against him, his winter grey eyes black with passion.

The ice that encased Jenny's body shattered, and she shrieked in fright and pain as the shards cut into her body. The floor gave way beneath her feet, and she was falling, screaming and crying as she fell … then she hit the floor again, painfully so, her honey-coloured hair spilling around her face as she sobbed on the ground, covering her head with her arms.

"No one can touch you Jenny."

Footsteps hit the floor under Jenny's cheek, someone walking towards her slowly as the tears kept coming, trickling down her cheeks and into her hair. They knelt beside her, and touched her honey locks tentatively before stroking her hair softly, soothingly.

"No one but me."

Jenny raised her head slightly, trying to shake away all the thoughts of everyone's pain as thick tears oozed from her green eyes, and she rested her forehead against the lap of the stranger as they kept stroking her hair, soft as a cat's paw. She didn't have a single clue to what was going on, her friends weren't there, she didn't know where she was, or what she was going to do, She had been trapped in ice and shadows, she had fallen into darkness, and the voices and images that had attacked her mind had terrified her, and all that seemed to be real was the steady stroking and comforting warmth of the person who had walked to her out of the void.

Jenny sat up, her eyes squeezed tight against the tears and she slid her arms around the person who had been stroking her hair, pressing her face against their shoulder as she trembled all over in fright. It seemed to be a man, because there were muscles hard underneath her arms and face, and his arms wrapped around her tightly, one hand still stroking her hair as he murmured soothingly to her. Jenny was grateful for any warmth that she was given, and this man, his fingers moving carefully through her hair, touching the roots gently, made her feel safe, enough here, in this place of shadows.

But …the feeling of cool fingertips against her hair roots felt so familiar to her … just like he had touched her … in that paper house …

Jenny choked back a sound of panic as she jerked backwards with some difficulty out of his tight embrace, landing flat on her back, but back peddling quickly away from the white haired young man knelt on the floor, a soft smirk on his sculpted face as he stood, dressed in a black t-shirt with the sleeves rolled up and black denim jeans. Jenny didn't know how she could see him in the darkness, but it was like there was a white light all around him.

It made no sense of course: Julian was a Shadow Man, something for which the light never shone. Why would he be glowing, let alone a white aura, when white was considered the purest and holiest of lights.

"He's really does think about you, you know." The Shadow Man told her softly, like he was merely a shadow of his former self, before he had been carved off the rune stave, "I thought I should let you know."

This was all insane. Jenny shook her head furiously; Julian had vanished after he had helped Jenny and her friends escape, after she had won the third and final game. He had simply faded away in her arms, like smoke up a chimney, because the older Shadow Men cut his name out of the rune stave that had brought him into existence. How could he be here?

Come to think of it, where was here?

"… who are you talking about?" It was the only question she could think of asking. 'What the hell are you doing here' seemed to be a bad question to ask for some reason.

Julian's heavy eyelashes drooped, just like they always did when he was amused by something. It was Julian, definitely.

"You don't remember?"

The darkness around them seemed to twist, replacing the black void with four very solid walls. One wall was covered with a huge garage door, metal and familiar, and there was a table against another wall, the concrete covered with photographs and prints. Jenny knew where they were.

"Zach's garage." She said quietly, getting to her feet to look around, though unnecessarily; this place was like a second home to her, because she spent a lot of time in the converted studio with her cousin. There were prints on the walls that she remembered very well, including the one of the stacked cafeteria tables that had taken an entire night to prepare, even when everyone had helped, working relentlessly as Zach's perfectionist nature kept them readjusting and making everything just right for the photos. It had been fun … Why had Julian brought her here?

"Not quite." Julian replied, shaking his head. The door that would normally lead into the house swung open, and Jenny let out a soft gasp of surprise as … well, herself walked in. It was like a ghost of herself, but unmistakably, undeniably, it was herself. She was wearing a tissue-linen blouse – one of her favourite things to wear on an important occasion – a long cream skirt and a vest over the blouse that shone bright gold.

Jenny knew this memory. She knew what was going to happen. She turned to Julian sharply as her shadowy self looked around the room, clearly wondering whose nightmare it was.

"Stop it."

"You don't want to remember?" Julian asked politely, tilting his head to one side as he looked questioningly at her.

"I remember what happened," Jenny shook her head, "I don't need reminding."

"You really don't?" Julian's incredible unnaturally blue eyes followed the shadow Jenny's progress to the dark room, "You never questioned it?"

What did he mean by that? Curious in spite of herself, Jenny frowned slightly, her dark brush-stroke eyebrows knitting together slightly as she shot him a questioning glance. Julian's smile broadened, as though challenging her, then he walked after the memory into the dark room, Jenny following after a moment of deliberation, pushing the curtain aside as he let it swing closed behind him.

There was the shadowy form of her blond haired cousin in the room. Jenny could remember the clothes: the flannel shirt, stone washed jeans. The old running shoes that she remembered her aunt had been telling him to throw out a week or so before Tom's birthday, but she hadn't nagged at him, because he had come down with the flu. Zach collapsed on the concrete floor even as she and Julian watched, the ghost Jenny catching him in her arms as he fell, comforting him as he clung to her like a frightened child.

"What do you mean?" Jenny asked, tearing her eyes away.

"Hmm?" Julian looked side-ways towards her, as though he hadn't been listening, though the smile gave it away that he was laughing at her.

"What do you mean 'you never questioned it'?" Jenny quoted him, her frown deepening as she folded her arms and turned towards him.

"You never did question it then?"

"What didn't I question?" Jenny asked, her teeth gritting together from frustration. Julian smirked slightly before gesturing to the ghosts of Jenny Thornton and her cousin on the floor, holding on to each other as if their lives depended on it.

"Why I masqueraded as your dear cousin, rather than someone else. Instead of Tom, which would have made it easier. Instead of Michael, even. Why did I choose Zach, who would be the most unlikely one to ever show feelings for you, and the most likely boy that you would shove away?" Julian's eyes flashed, and the smirk widened as Jenny's frown abruptly vanished.

Jenny tried to say something, to open her mouth and say something clever to stop him cold, but she couldn't. Because she knew that what he was saying made sense, his tone soft and reasonable. Logical, even. And what could she do against that?

"Why did you choose Zach?" It came out as a whisper.

Julian's answer was a simple one.

"Because he thinks about you. And apparently … " His eyes were fixed on the impostor Zach, sat on the floor, kissing Jenny, and she wasn't pushing him away, " … you think about him."

"I don't." Jenny replied straight away, without any hesitation. "I don't think about Zach romantically. And Zach doesn't think about me. You're lying."

"You seem pretty sure of that," Julian said, still watching as the blond head of Zach slowly changed to his own frost-white head, the shadow of Jenny not realising because her eyes were still closed as she slid her hands through the silky tendrils. Jenny was carefully avoiding looking at them.

"I am sure."

"Why didn't you push him away then?"

Jenny hesitated for a moment, "He … he was trying to make me feel better … I thought … I thought … " Anger flashed through her mind, and she stopped before snapping at him, "I don't know why I'm telling you this! It was you, not Zach."

"You didn't know that though," Julian pointed out quietly, pointing at the shadow Jenny as she pulled away, realisation dawning on her face as she looked into the sapphire eyes of the Shadow Man, whimpering in fright, "That was slightly obvious from your reaction."

"But …" Jenny was floundering, and she knew it. She couldn't think of what she could say. "But …"

"He never told you?" Julian sounded politely incredulous, "He's watched you too, you know. Why do you think that he distanced himself from you as you both got older?"

"He … he doesn't …" Her sentences were falling apart, because everything he said was true.

Julian's smile was grim now, a smile that cried of inevitability. She could see the look of longing in his eyes, of wanting to touch her, hold her in his arms again, but for some reason, even after all he had said to disturb and unnerve her, he couldn't. Rather than scaring her, it reminded her of the vulnerable Julian she had seen in the mine of that theme park, calling her back to life and begging her to wake up.

"Why are you here?" Jenny whispered. "You … vanished … you're …"

"Dead?" Julian finished her sentence for her, and there was a flicker of sorrow in his sapphire eyes for a moment, but disappeared as Jenny blinked, "I still am."

"But you're not … you're here …"

"You don't have to take my word on this, you know."

"What?" Jenny asked suddenly, thankful that she could finally say something even though she didn't know what he was talking about.

"Maybe you should go ask Zachary about it yourself."

Then, with a rushing noise and the feeling of falling as the dark room, the shadows and Julian all faded away, Jenny Thornton woke up with a jerk in her bedroom in California, screaming because of all the voices in her head that wouldn't stop reminding her of what had happened.

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Authoress notes**: Upon writing this chapter, I decided to write a second chapter to describe what happened, instead of merely writing it onto this one. That will be the last chapter though; I've got other things to do, unfortunately.

I apologise if I made Julian or Jenny out of character, or got anything wrong. Review, please.

-SC- / -MyHeartBleeds-


	2. Even Though

**Disclaimer**: I don't own the Forbidden Game series. I don't own Jenny, Julian, Zach, Tom, Audrey, Summer, Michael, or Dee, or any other characters mentioned, etc.

**Notes**: Onto the Jenny confronting Zach, which I'll write in under six hours like the last chapter … huzzah for madness and boredness. And onto the answers of reviews …

**incarnated soul**: Thanks for the first review and the author watch; not a wise move with all the rubbish I write, but still :P Wasn't sure if anyone would entertain this, let alone read it. When I think about it, Julian should have been angry, I suppose. Will the fact that it was a dream suffice for an excuse? ::cough:: Crappy excuse, I know… And thanks for telling me about the 'no italics' thing (damn typos ¬¬)

**ck**: Eep, someone noticed. Believe me, I'm very aware that Julian gained Jenny's forgiveness before he died BUT It was a dream. A crappy excuse, I know, but I have had a lot of dreams when people act absolutely nothing like they usually do. I tried to put the fact that Jenny forgave him into this, but it didn't work very well. Forgive me for clinging onto Julian's typical self, instead of the humbled person he became at the end of 'The Kill.' Thanks for reviewing too ::smiles::

I got banned halfway through writing this, for spending too much time writing … doesn't seem to make much sense to me. Time to introduce conflict and all nasty things (the fact that I read a VERY funny Forbidden Game fic halfway through this didn't help XD Must go sober myself up now. A nice angst fic would be nice.)

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**---Chapter Two---**

"Jenny, are you okay?"

Stopping in the process of forcing her arm through the sleeve of her denim jacket, still slightly damp because she had pulled it out of the dryer before it had finished, Jenny nervously eyed the look that her mother was giving her from the kitchen table. It was a searching look, with a slightly suspicious edge to it; her mother had taken to looking at her like that since the incident last year. Jenny supposed she deserved it … taking, no, stealing six hundred dollars to buy a plane ticket to her grandfather's old house, and then calling from Pennsylvania in the middle of the night for someone to get them home after the final game against Julian, not uttering a word to anyone what had happened …

When she thought about it, her mother did have a good reason to be suspicious of her, though she wasn't really in the mood to answer endless questions at the moment.

"No. Why?" She asked, pushing her arm through finally and zipping up the front, hoping that this wasn't going to be one of those conversations that went on for hours, ending with her mother crying. She had taken to doing that a lot lately as well.

"Well …" Shaking her dark honey hair – so like Jenny's – out of her eyes, her mother intertwined her fingers and looked down at them, like she was checking if her nail polish was chipped. She always did that when she felt awkward, though that didn't happen very often. But simply the fact that she felt awkward, Mrs Thornton, forever the cool level-headed woman, was enough to stop Jenny's fingers on the zipper. "You had another nightmare last night, didn't you?"

How the hell did she know? Jenny sometimes had the feeling that her mother could read her mind, and she had the uncanny ability to know when something was wrong, even if it was simply like a bad day at school, or if Tom had snapped at her over some petty little thing. Jenny's fingers fumbled on the zip of her jacket, clicking nervously together; she was never very good at hiding when she was nervous.

"How'd you know?"

Her mother hesitated, obviously wondering how to say as she shook her head again, "… you screamed in your sleep … again."

Oh God. Not again.

Jenny had suffered from nightmares more after the Games, but after what she had been put through, who wouldn't? She knew for a fact that Audrey still had bad dreams of the ride of Love and Despair, and after Summer's ordeal, it would be a long time before the tiny girl could sleep with the light off again. She wasn't sure if Dee, Zach, Michael or Tom still had nightmares of what had happened, but one thing was sure: their encounter with Julian and the realm of the Shadow Men was going to be something that haunted them for a very long time.

"Do you want to tell me what happened?" Jenny's mother's voice cut through the thread of thoughts, bringing her back to reality with a jerk. Her tone was soft and concerned, and it reminded Jenny of Julian's voice in her dreams. The memory of that dream sent involuntary shivers down her spine, and Jenny shuddered slightly, something that the watchful eyes of her mother caught instantly.

"What's wrong?" She sounded like she thought Jenny was having a fit or something, not just a little shiver, her voice panicky. Wrapping her arms around herself, Jenny turned her dark green eyes to her mother and she forced a smile to reassure herself as much as the woman sat at the table.

"Nothing. It was just a little kids dream last night, that's all." Knowing her mother wasn't convinced, she hastily made at exit through the living room, across the tiles and into the hall way and the front door. Picking up the black woollen gloves from the small table near the door and pulling them on, she called to her mother, "I'm going to Zach's, okay?"

"Isn't it a little early?"

Jenny looked at the clock hanging on the wall: 9:18am. What with it being a Saturday and the weather having dropped to below zero, it was very possible that Zach wouldn't be out of bed yet. But … she needed to talk to him. Now, if not sooner, and this wasn't really one of those things you could talk about over the phone.

"I gotta talk to him about a school project," Jenny heard herself saying as she wound a scarf around her neck and picked up her house keys from the glass dish resting on the hall table; her father insisted that the doors would always be locked after their house had been broken into last year, though the doors hadn't even been touched then, "It's due in for next week and we've left it a little late."

Please don't ask me any awkward questions, please don't ask me, please please please –

"Call us if it's late when you decide to come home, okay? I don't want you walking home in the dark."

"Aunt Lil will probably give me a lift home if I ask," Jenny called back, thanking the heavens that her mother hadn't questioned anything. She felt slightly guilty as she gripped the door handle; she hated lying, especially since there had been no need to lie to her mother. It was like Jenny wanted to keep this secret, like it was humiliating or something … shaking her head slightly, Jenny opened the door, "See you later Mom!"

"Make sure you work hard on your project!" Jenny heard her mother call as she pulled the door closed with a click and Jenny locked it behind her before making her way down the path to the gate. Cosette hissed at her as she walked by, looking sodden and furious as she squinted up at her owner, and she took a swipe at Jenny's hand as the seventeen year old stooped to pet her. Jenny withdrew her hand quickly as the cream and grey cat shot off, it's tail in the air, and she frowned; Cosette had only started biting and scratching after Julian had gone.

Making her way down the road, her boots clacking gently on the pavement, Jenny wondered if she was doing the right thing. Julian could be lying – as he had reminded her on several occasions, he was not hide-bound to tell the truth. Saying that, he rarely lied. He withheld information, he would obscure the truth, but he didn't often lie.

It wasn't …sporting, to lie. It wasn't fair.

Why was she thinking this? Jenny slowed a little from her brisk walk, a little unsure as she thought about it. It was a dream. Julian was gone, unless someone had carved him back onto the rune stave, and he would have come to her in person by now if it were so, not appear in a dream talking about Zach, of all people. And he wouldn't have been so … spiteful if he had returned, since they had been on friendly terms of sorts when he'd died, because she'd wanted to help him, forgiven him. But … he'd said he was still gone in her dream. So he was still gone, then? But he appeared in her dream, and …

… this was enough to give anyone a headache.

Realising that she was rapidly coming to Zach's house, Jenny came to a dead stop. She had to decide now. Either to go and ask him if what Julian had said was true, to just visit him, or to simply go to Dee's or Audrey's until she decided. The last choice seemed very appealing, indeed, more so than the first two. Damn Julian! It was his fault that she couldn't get the picture of Zach kissing her out of her head. It had **not** been Zach, it never was or had been Zach, and Jenny knew very well that her cousin never thought about her romantically.

But …

… what if Julian wasn't lying. She hadn't really thought much about of the dark room incident after they had escaped from the paper house, having locked Julian inside the closet in her nightmare. Simply seeing Zach back to normal, apathetic and silent again, it had been like it was ridiculous, impossible. No matter what Julian had told her in the basement.

**"You want to watch out for that cousin of yours, too. He really does think about you, you know. I took that impression from life."** Jenny could even remember the look on his face when he had told her, a look of wild, angry blue fire. Jenny had laughed then, nearly hysterically at the thought of Zach, her cousin who paid no attention to girls, only lenses and cameras, actually … wanting her.

He'd shown interest in girls recently though, she supposed … a week or two after they had returned to California, Summer had walked into Jenny's house, giggling hysterically and jibbering incoherently. After Jenny had gotten her to calm down, Summer blurted out that she'd gone to Zach's to get a book, and he had simply leaned toward her when they were talking and kissed her. It had been such a shock, so unusual; cool Zach, distant Zach, making the first move on a girl. Summer had told Jenny because Zach was her cousin, she didn't think he would mind her knowing, and sure enough, when she phoned him later, he had told her it was true. He wasn't jubilant, true, but for the first time in too long, Jenny had heard a warm edge to her cousin's voice, and when she had seen him and Summer out together, his eyes had been so warm, rather than his normal winter-cool.

It hadn't lasted long, true. Three weeks, a month, but he had been happy when they were together, regardless of what people were saying at school. That was why they had split up; because of the laughing at school, mocking them, the sun-bunny and the cold artist. There was no mercy for Summer because the sympathy of her disappearance had long faded. Winter and Summer don't mix, they said. Zach remained indifferent, uncaring that they laughed at him, but it had upset Summer a great deal, and one day, someone had asked them in the hallway if Zach asked to photograph her naked, amid the sniggering and laughter of his friends.

It had been awful. Summer burst into tears, Zach keeping his silence but his face was white and pinched as it always was when he got angry, his grey eyes flashing. Tom had gotten into an argument with the guy, getting to the point where they were about to throw a punch, but a teacher had broken it up, dispersing the crowd that had gathered around the sobbing Summer, who was kneeling on the floor and clinging to Zach as though her life depended on it. About five people got dragged into the principal's office, one getting suspension for two weeks, but that didn't fix what had happened, and that night, away from the curious eyes of Michael and Audrey, they had agreed that they should stop.

"You shouldn't, you two," Audrey had said to the sun-bunny as Summer announced this the next day, "You shouldn't break up just because of all these … these … " she deliberated for a moment, trying to think of something bad enough to call them, " … pig-headed, shallow, moronic idiots."

Zach wisely enough avoided the interrogations of Audrey for the next few days, keeping to the photo lab and sharply moving stealthily out of the way when she appeared in the corridors, usually tailed by Michael. Audrey wasn't nosey, but she considered herself the expert in relationships in their group, and since Summer and Zach had now proven themselves apart of the relationship-hunting market in her eyes, the seventeen year old had set her sights on giving them advice to get them back together. Michael, forever the insatiably curious one, had taken to following her to see what was happening, like it was his favourite soap opera or something.

After a while, fortunately, she had stopped, though Audrey often pointed out people on the streets to Summer and Zach, simply to see if there was any reaction. Summer had had several boyfriends since, thanks to Audrey's love of matchmaking, though Zach never seemed to find a girlfriend after that. Not that Jenny or anyone else knew about anyway. Zach protected his privacy.

Prying her mind away from those thoughts and back to the main … dilemma, Jenny frowned, her brush-stroke eyebrows knitting together. Jenny was becoming awkwardly aware of the fact that she had been stood in the middle of the pavement for the past ten minutes, and her feet were getting cold in her boots.

**"You want to watch out for that cousin of yours, too. He really thinks about you, you know. I took that impression from life."**Julian had said.

If she asked him, she didn't know how he'd take it. It would be like proclaiming her undying love for him or something – he might distance himself from her even more than he already did. Oh God, might? No, he'd shut her out completely, no might about it.

Oh God.

Damn you Julian.

Damn it damn it damn it …

Jenny sighed, sending breath crystals about her face, then she glanced at her watch. 10:25am. Zach would probably be awake by now. Jenny vaguely remembered that Zach had told her he was going out today, so she needed to get moving now, or she'd probably miss him.

The thought of agonising over this all day was enough. Jenny turned and walked quickly down the road towards Zach's house, muttering under her breath.

"Damn you Julian …"

--o--

"Good morning Jenny." Her aunt smiled as she let Jenny in, the woman still dressed in her pyjamas; evidently, she hadn't been awake long.

"Morning Aunt Lil," Jenny nodded, moving forward automatically to kiss her aunt's cheek as the door was closed quickly behind her to shut out the cold. Aunt Lil rubbed her hands together as Jenny took off her gloves and scarf and hung them up next to the door, taking off her jacket as well, "Is Zach here?"

"Zach's upstairs Jenny," her aunt nodded, still rubbing her arms to get rid of the sudden cold.

"Still." Her uncle called from the living room. Jenny turned to her aunt, a questioning look on her face as Aunt Lil shook her head in her husband's direction.

"Zachary's not been going out much," she muttered to her niece, as though to prevent Zach's father from hearing. Unfortunately, the man seemed to have super sonic-hearing or something, for he called back straight away.

"When does he go out? It's not normal, he's seventeen for God's sake."

"Zach enjoys his own company," Aunt Lil replied loudly, rolling her eyes.

"How normal is that? Most guys his age are going out every night so their parents have to drag them back in at stupid hours in the morning, not sitting in their rooms writing goddamned stories or fiddling with cameras in a converted garage."

As he continued ranting in this vein, Aunt Lil sighed in exasperation before motioning upstairs.

"He'll be in his room Jenny."

"Thanks."

Turning away from the continuing argument about her cousin, Jenny made her way upstairs, each of the steps creaking under her feet. Moving across the landing, Jenny came to a halt in front of the door of Zach's bedroom.

_What now?_ She could still back out. Turn around, walk out the front door and go home, or somewhere. She could still …

Lies. All of it. Of course they were all lies. She couldn't back out. She had to know. She didn't know why. She just had to.

Even though every cell in her mind was screaming for her to stop it, Jenny reached out and knocked on the door. "Zach? Can I come in?"

After a moment or two, there was a murmur of 'yes.' Opening the door, Jenny stepped into the room, and spotted her cousin sat at his desk opposite from her. Closing the door with a click, she walked over and looked over his shoulder at the typewriter he was typing at, his face intense as his fingers flew across the letters. Zach had taken to writing a lot a month or so ago, and a typewriter seemed to suit him (for some reason, Zach didn't like to write on computers.) Unlike when he quite eagerly let Jenny look at the prints and photographs he created, he was very protective of his stories.

"Hey Zach. What are you writing?" She asked as he finished one page, pulling it out carefully, putting it onto a pile of paper next to him and sliding another clean piece of paper into the writer. She tried to look at the work he had written already, but with a quick movement of his hands, her cousin turned over the paper so she was looking at the blank side.

Jenny had expected as much, so it didn't bother her. Walking away and sitting on the blue duvet of Zach's almost scarily tidy bed, she idly looked over the contents of his bed side table as he typed; a book or two, a note, written in a scrawl Jenny recognised as her cousin's writing, an excerpt from 'Dante's Inferno', and a rock. Jenny picked it up with a slight frown, turning it over in her hands and examining it carefully. Could it be …?

No mistake. In Zach's true nightmare, Jenny had found him crouched beside a black canvas, streaked with silver, and he kept putting this rock onto the paper. Jenny knew he had kept it from the nightmare, talking about still wanting to do the photograph, but in the year that had passed since the Games had stopped, she hadn't seen it, it being one of those little details that she'd pushed to the back of her mind. Unimportant. Just one of those little things.

Why'd he kept it for so long?

Still holding the rock in her hands, Jenny looked over to her cousin, still staring intently at the typewriter as his brow furrowed in concentration. The main reason she usually came to visit Zach was because he listened. True, he was too good at listening and not very good at talking, but Zach was always a good person to turn to when she needed someone to simply listen to her problems. Not if she started crying though; Dee or Audrey were better people for that, and she knew Zach felt awkward if she flung her arms around him and started sobbing uncontrollably. But her cousin always listened, and he never repeated anything she said, whether she asked him not to or not.

"Zach," Jenny began, like she did every time she wanted him to listen, "Can I talk to you about something?"

The sound of typing stopped, and with a scraping noise that raised the hairs on Jenny's neck, Zach turned his chair around to face her, his face politely curious, though Jenny knew her cousin too well to be fooled by the act he put on for her. She could feel her heart thumping painfully in her chest, wondering madly why she was doing this, jeopardising her longest friendship and possibly driving Zach so far away from her that she wouldn't be able to get him back.

"Well …" Closing her eyes so she wouldn't see his face, Jenny took a deep breath that sounded like a sigh, " … do you remember the first Game?"

"Yes." Of course he did. As if he would ever forget.

Jenny was shaking. Every brain cell, no, every cell in her body was screaming over and over again for her to just shut up, laugh and shake her head, say it didn't matter and carry on. What the hell was she doing, for Christ's sake?

"Jenny, are you alright?"

She opened her eyes to see Zach's brow furrowing again, this time with concern. She realised that her eyes were watering, and she blinked furiously to get them away before he'd see –

"Jenny, are you crying?"

Dammit! Her cousin stood, shoving up his flannel shirt as he reached inside his jeans pocket, producing a packet of tissues; Jenny vaguely remembered that he caught cold easily, so he always seemed to carry tissues with him. As he passed her one, he sat next to her on his bed, watching her mop up her tears clumsily as he waited for her to speak again. His eyes had warmed fractionally, as they always did around Jenny, and that simply made her feel more self-conscious.

After blowing her nose and crumpling up the white tissue in her hand, the rock resting in her lap, she took another breath before beginning again.

"Zach … in the first game …" Jenny repeated, trying to steady her voice as she spoke, " … before I came into your nightmare …"

It was now or never. Damning herself to Nilfheim and back for doing this, she looked Zach straight in the eye and spoke in a voice that was just above a whisper.

"Julian … he appeared in your studio in the paper house … I thought it was your nightmare because … because … "

_Don't don't don't don't don't don't don't don't don't don't, oh please God, don't …_

"What?" Zach looked slightly unnerved by Jenny's sudden breakdown, as though he didn't have a single clue how to deal with it. Most of the time, if there was a near-hysterical girl involved, Zach's philosophy was to be far, _far_ away. She didn't blame him, to be honest.

Trying to calm down for both their sakes, her face flushing with shame, Jenny took several deep breaths and then she spoke that sentence.

"He made himself look like you."

The silence was almost deafening, roaring in her ears. His eyes shone with something she couldn't recognise, but before she could look closer, it vanished.

"What do you mean?" He asked carefully.

"He made himself look like you." Jenny whispered, nearly too quiet for her cousin to hear. "And … I thought he was you. I thought it was you going through your nightmare. So I didn't push him away when he collapsed … or when he kissed me."

Jenny heard the sharp intake of breath, and she closed her eyes again. She'd said it. If he questioned, she'd have to explain further and she really didn't want to do that.

"Let me get this straight," Zach's voice spoke, simply level and empty, though it shook slightly. "He appeared in the garage room that led to my nightmare."

"Yes."

"He looked like me."

"Yes."

"And he pretended to be me."

"Yes."

"And … he kissed you."

"Yes, Zach." Jenny answered.

"And you didn't push him away."

"No."

There was silence again, then the sound of a heavy sigh as Zach obviously tried to understand this.

"Why are you telling me this?"

Jenny opened her eyes, startled to see her cousin's cold eyes flashing with … anger? No, but something close to it. Had she made him angry with her?

His face was pinched and paling, the dark circles below his eyes more pronounced than usual, "Why are you telling me this now?"

Jenny turned her eyes away, "Julian appeared in my dream last night – "

"He's back?" There was a note of panic in his voice, like there was in all her friend's voices if she even simply mentioned Julian's name in their company.

"No," Jenny shook her head, "Nothing like that. But he reminded me of what happened … and what he had said when we were in grandpa's basement."

"What did he say?"

"W-What?"

Zach's face was more intense than ever, burning with a sort of fire Jenny had never seen in his face before, "What did Julian tell you in the basement?"

"He said …" Jenny was shaking furiously; this was going so much worse than she imagined, why hadn't she just not said anything? "He said … that I should watch out for … you. Because … you think about me, that's why he chose to appear as you …"

She trailed off, her eyes dropping to the floor and her hands picking up the rock again as he stared incredulously at her.

Zach was wearing an expression that looked so out of place on him, it almost made him look like a stranger to Jenny, the girl who'd known him all her life. Zach had kept up barriers against everyone for a long time just to keep everyone around him at arm's length, so when they dropped, it made him look … different. Vulnerable. Just like everyone else.

"I'm sorry Zach," Jenny whispered as he got to his feet, as though he couldn't bear to sit near her.

"You believe him?" Zach snapped suddenly, as though trying to make it a lie, though the look of fright that flickered in his eyes confirmed everything. Jenny stood up, dropping the rock onto the duvet as she lifted her hand up to touch his arm, but he flinched away.

"Zach, don't do this."

"Leave me alone," he snapped again, the walls sliding back into place a thousand times thicker, and Jenny stepped back, blinking back tears again. He had raised his walls against her, knocking her back and away from him, because he didn't want her near him. And she'd never get back in.

"Zach, please, I just want to –"

"What?" Zach questioned, taking a step toward her. "What do you want to do?"

Jenny met his eyes squarely, her own eyes leaking over, "To … apologise … and to just talk."

"I'm sorry Jenny, but I don't think so." Zach shook his head, seizing his running shoes from next to the desk and yanking them on.

"Zach, don't you think you're overreacting?" Jenny asked, grabbing the sleeve of his shirt as he straightened and made for the door.

"No."

"Zachary, please, I just want to – "

He turned, and Jenny's eyes widened again as she felt Zach kiss her. Not a cousinly kiss, not their customary peck on the cheek, and even that would be from Jenny, because Zach was never really affectionate. But … he was holding her against him, and his mouth was pressed against hers. And …

… even though she loved Tom more than anything in the world …

… even though Zach was her cousin, and it was wrong …

… even though she knew she shouldn't …

… Jenny didn't pull away. She wasn't sure if she had simply stood there in his arms or if she had responded, but either way, Jenny didn't pull away from him, even as he wrapped his arms so tightly around her that it hurt.

Then he pulled away and he was gone, running off down the stairs as fast as he could. She heard the front door slam, and her uncle's cry of 'Finally! He's left the house!'

Jenny touched her lips, sore from that kiss.

"Zach …"

**"You want to watch out for that cousin of yours, too. He really thinks about you, you know. I took that impression from life." **Julian had said.

"Oh my God …"

--o--

He was running as fast as he could. To get as far away as he could, far away from her, his mother, his father, his home. Far far away. He didn't want to see her again.

How could he show his face again?

Damn it damn it damn it! How could he have been so stupid?! He'd kissed her, for God's sake. There was no way to hide it now. If he hadn't been so stupid, he'd have still been able to deny it, even though she would have seen right through it anyway. How the hell was he supposed to talk to her again, how could he face Audrey, Dee, Summer, Michael after this? Hell, how was he supposed to talk to Tom Locke again without passing out from the guilt?

It was wrong. It was filthy, because they shared the same blood. How many times had he gone over that in his head? He tried to stamp it out, purge his mind of thoughts of her, he really did, but it never worked. It hurt to see her with Tom, like it had hurt to see her with Julian, and that's why he had got angry with her, because she did all that without even realising that it hurt him. That was why he kept even her away from him, because he wanted to deny it, he wanted to hide it, because he was ashamed.

Was there something wrong with him? Was it like how madness had supposedly ran in the family? Had his mother or father just past on a gene that made him look at Jennifer Thornton, his cousin and oldest friend, of all people?

He'd thought because he had actually liked Summer, watched her, he thought he might have finally squashed the feeling out, but …

…

Even as Zach came to a halt, close to collapsing from exhaustion, even as he sat on the bench on the edge of the woods covered in frost, empty because of the cold and ice, even as he watched his heavy breath cloud in front of his face as he put his head back and stared at the white sky …

… even as he damned himself, he smiled faintly, because Jenny had kissed him back.

* * *

Authoress notes: I claim Zach/Jenny ::grins::

I know Zach's behaviour at the end of this was out of character, but he was angry and angsty :P. I'm not too sure whether to carry this on, or finish it here, because I'm bad at finishing stories ;;; I hope you enjoyed it as much as I did (I loved writing this, by the way, uwee hee.)

Review please. Criticism very welcome, especially if I got something wrong. I lost inspiration as I reached the end (mainly because I was crying with laughter because I read something about Zach being an alien ) so I'm sorry for it's dwindling quality towards the end. The kiss at the end wasn't something I planned into this either, it just … happened.

I'm sorry I put that quote in so often, but I liked it ::laughs:: Tell me if you want this continued or not, ideas and such, and I may write another chapter.

-SC / MyHeartBleeds-


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